A PERILOUS SERVICE
Writing of these events afterward, Captain Hull said, "It was evident
that the superior force of the British would soon give them possession
of New York. The Commander-in-chief, therefore, took a position at Fort
Washington at the other end of the island. To ascertain the further
object of the enemy was now a subject of anxious inquiry with General
Washington."
In a letter to General Heath at this crisis Washington wrote as follows:
"As everything in a manner depends upon obtaining intelligence of the
enemy's motions, I do most earnestly entreat you and General Clinton to
exert yourselves to accomplish this most desirable end. Leave no stone
unturned, nor do not stick at expense, to bring this to pass, as I never
was more uneasy than on account of my want of knowledge on this score."
Johnston, in his valuable "Life of Nathan Hale," says: "If he
[Washington] had been anxious to fathom Howe's plans before the latter
began the campaign from Staten Island, he was infinitely more so now.
It was not enough to keep a ceaseless watch across the East river....
Like every other commander in history, all through the contest he came
to depend much on intelligence gained through the 'secret service.'"
Stuart, the earliest reliable biographer of Hale, in writing of spies
says: "The exigency of the American army which we have just described,
would not permit the employment, in the service proposed, of any
ordinary soldier, unpracticed in military observation and without skill
as a draughtsman,--least of all of the common mercenary, to whom,
allured by the hope of a large reward, such tasks are usually assigned.
Accurate estimates of the numbers of the enemy, of their distribution,
of the form and position of their various encampments, of their
marchings and countermarchings, of the concentration at one point or
another, of the instruments of war, but more than all of their plan of
attack, as derived from the open report or the unguarded whispers in
camp of officers or men,--estimates of all these things, requiring a
quick eye, a cool head, a practical pencil, military science, general
intelligence, and pliable address, were to be made. The common soldier
would not answer the purpose, and the mercenary might yield to the
higher seductions of the enemy, and betray his employers."
During the war with the French and Indians, American officers had
learned the need of trained men who could keep the commanders informed
both of the movements and of the plans of the opposing forces.
Washington had learned this unforgetable lesson in Braddock's campaign,
and, as full commander and wholly responsible not only for the immediate
safety but for the future success of his little army, he realized the
necessity of obtaining the most accurate information possible.
A corps collected from the best men in the army was organized, and its
command was given to Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Knowlton. He had gained
experience as a ranger in the French and Indian War, and was noted for
his coolness, skill, and bravery at Bunker Hill. One hundred and fifty
men and twenty officers were considered sufficient for the work assigned
to this special corps, known as Knowlton's Rangers. They were divided
into four companies. Two of the captains of these men were chosen from
Knowlton's own regiment; the other two--one of them Nathan Hale--were
from other companies. There can be little doubt that Nathan Hale was
proud of his enrollment in this brave corps.
After Hale's services were ended, one brief record remained of "moneys
due to the Company of Rangers commanded late by Captain Hale." After the
1st of September, about which time this company of Rangers was
organized, it was constantly on duty wherever its services were
required, and one can easily imagine Nathan Hale's enthusiasm in his
enlarged duties.
Knowlton spoke to some of his officers of the wishes of the commanding
general for some one to enter upon this special secret service,--wishes
that so appealed to Hale that he at once seriously considered offering
himself for the hazardous undertaking.
Captain Hull, two years his senior in age, and one year in advance of
him in Yale, a close friend while in college and during their subsequent
days, shall describe the personal interview between himself and Captain
Hale in regard to this matter. It is said that many remonstrated with
Hale at his decision, but Hull's statement shows the arguments of a
practical man against which Hale had to contend.
In his memoirs Captain Hull writes thus of his last interview with
Captain Hale:
"After his interview with Col. Knowlton, he repaired to my quarters and
informed me of what had passed. He remarked 'I think I owe to my
country the accomplishment of an object so important, and so much
desired by the commander of her armies--and I know of no other mode of
obtaining the information than by assuming a disguise and passing into
the enemy's camp.'
"He asked my candid opinion. I replied that it was an act which involved
serious consequences, and the propriety of it was doubtful; and though
he viewed the business of a spy as a duty, yet he could not officially
be required to perform it; that such a service was not claimed of the
meanest soldier, though many might be willing, for a pecuniary
compensation, to engage in it; and as for himself, the employment was
not in keeping with his character. His nature was too frank and open for
deceit and disguise, and he was incapable of acting a part equally
foreign to his feelings and habits. Admitting that he was successful,
who would wish success at such a price? Did his country demand the moral
degradation of her sons, to advance her interests?
"Stratagems are resorted to in war; they are feints and evasions,
performed under no disguise; are familiar to commanders; form a part of
their plans, and, considered in a military view, lawful and
advantageous. The tact with which they are executed exacts admiration
from the enemy. But who respects the character of a spy, assuming the
garb of friendship but to betray? The very death assigned him is
expressive of the estimation in which he is held. As soldiers, let us do
our duty in the field; contend for our legitimate rights, and not stain
our honor by the sacrifice of integrity. And when present events, with
all their deep and exciting interests, shall have passed away, may the
blush of shame never arise, by the remembrance of an unworthy though
successful act, in the performance of which we were deceived by the
belief that it was sanctioned by its object. I ended by saying that,
should he undertake the enterprise, his short, bright career would close
with an ignominious death.
"He replied, 'I am fully sensible of the consequences of discovery and
capture in such a situation. But for a year I have been attached to the
army, and have not rendered any material service, while receiving a
compensation for which I make no return. Yet,' he continued, 'I am not
influenced by the expectation of promotion or pecuniary reward. I wish
to be useful, and every kind of service necessary for the public good,
becomes honorable by being necessary. If the exigencies of my country
demand a peculiar service, its claims to perform that service are
imperative!'
"He spoke with warmth and decision. I replied, 'That such are your
wishes cannot be doubted. But is this the most effectual mode of
carrying them into execution? In the progress of the war there will be
ample opportunity to give your talents and your life, should it be so
ordered, to the sacred cause to which we are pledged. You can bestow
upon your country the richest benefits, and win for yourself the highest
honours. Your exertions for her interests will be daily felt, while, by
one fatal act, you crush forever the power and opportunity Heaven offers
for her glory and your happiness.'
"I urged him for the love of country, for the love of kindred, to
abandon an enterprise which would only end in the sacrifice of the
dearest interests of both. He paused--then affectionately taking my
hand, he said, 'I will reflect, and do nothing but what duty demands.'
He was absent from the army, and I feared he had gone to the British
lines to execute his fatal purpose."
Just how soon after this conversation Captain Hale left camp on his
perilous mission, cannot now be determined. We only know that it must
have been early in September, during the first week or ten days. He
proceeded with Sergeant Hempstead by the safest route, and reached
Norwalk before finding a place to cross Long Island Sound.
Sergeant Hempstead alone has furnished the few details of Captain Hale's
final preparations. He had decided to assume civilian's dress, probably
that of an educated man seeking employment as tutor among the Americans
still living in New York. Hempstead says he was dressed in a brown suit
of citizen's clothes, with a round, broad-brimmed hat. On parting he
gave Hempstead his private papers and letters, and his silver
shoebuckles, to take care of for him.
It is, we think, not an undue inference that the letters and private
papers he left in Hempstead's care were all to be sent to his family.
These doubtless included personal letters to them, for no man such as we
know Nathan Hale to have been would have faced a journey from which he
might never return without some words of explanation, and possible
farewell, to those he loved at home. There is one fact that all who
believe in the sanctity of personal confidences and possible farewells
will be glad to remember,--that not one private word from Nathan Hale to
Alice Adams Ripley, or from her to him, has ever been exploited to
satisfy the curiosity of those who have no right to share it.
Hempstead left Captain Hale, who, now fully committed to his hazardous
quest, set forth on the armed sloop _Schuyler_ with Captain Pond--one of
the captains in the 19th Regiment--in command, across the Sound to Long
Island. When he landed Captain Hale said farewell to the last American
friend he was to be with, so far as we have any record.
Assuming that he reached this point on or near the 15th of September,
one or two other facts suggest themselves. It is known that the
Declaration of Independence had been carried to the American camp as
early as possible after its announcement in July, had been read to the
troops assembled for that purpose, and had been received with unbounded
enthusiasm. It is probable that both Colonel Knowlton, later in command
of the Rangers, and Captain Hale, one of its officers, were present at
that reading and joined in the huzzas. Singularly enough, neither one of
these two men was a citizen of the United States for three months.
Two months later Colonel Knowlton fell in the battle of Harlem Heights,
on September 16th, six days before Nathan Hale's execution. Knowlton's
last words are said to have been, "I do not care for my life, if we do
but win the day."
From the moment of his leaving New York, the mind of such a man as
Nathan Hale must have had solemn foreshadowings of the possible result,
of the tremendous risk he was facing. Men do not grow old by the passing
of years so much as by the endurance of great experiences, and in the
few brief days that were left to Nathan Hale we know really nothing of
his whereabouts, of what risks he ran, of how often he barely escaped
recognition as a spy, where he slept, of any possible friends whom he
may have encountered, or of any moment when his very life seemed to hang
on the accidental glance of an enemy's eye.
Finally dawned the 21st of September. Hale had fully accomplished his
mission.
There are conflicting accounts as to what occurred on the last evening
of Nathan Hale's life, some going into minute details of occurrences
that were assumed to have taken place. One with considerable
plausibility says that, as the time had elapsed which he had expected to
spend among the British (at the end of which time a boat was to be sent
across the Sound for him), Hale, having finished his quest, had entered
a tavern kept by a certain widow Chichester. She was a stanch friend of
the Tories, and her house was the constant resort of Tories and British
men and officers. While Hale was sitting in the tavern, apparently at
his ease among the men there assembled, some one passed him whose face
he thought familiar,--a man who glanced at him sharply and then passed
from the room. Later it was said to have been his own cousin who
betrayed him. Fortunately, there is not a word of truth in the
assertion.
Although Deacon Hale writes that his son was undoubtedly betrayed by
some one, it appears to have been effectually disproved that he was
betrayed by a relative--a cousin who, it is stated, had never seen him,
and therefore could not have recognized him. A much more probable rumor
is that he was recognized by a loyalist woman who might easily have seen
him before the American army retreated farther north on the island, and
been impressed by his personal appearance and by his prowess in kicking
the football over the trees in the Bowery. This feat Hale is said to
have performed.
The report goes on to say that a man suddenly entered saying that a boat
was approaching, and that Hale, supposing this boat to have been sent
for him, at once left the room and went to the shore. If there is any
truth in this narrative, it is very possible that here Hale committed
his one indiscretion. In his joy at seeing the friends who had been sent
for him, he may have uttered words of such joyous welcome that the
officer who heard them must have known that this was some one expecting
a boat, and presumably a boat from the opposite shore. At all events, it
is stated that Hale, seeing his mistake when several marines presented
their guns, turned to fly, stopping only when told by the officer to
stand or be shot. These events are said to have taken place at
Huntington, Long Island, about forty miles from New York.
But more than a century after Hale's death a British Orderly Book was
found, containing the statement, dated September 22d, 1776, that
follows:
[Illustration: See footnote [2]]
[Footnote 2: A spy fm the Enemy (by his own full Confession) Apprehended
Last night, was this day Executed at 11 o'clock in front of the Artilery
Park.
From an Orderly Book of the British Guard. Reproduced from the original
in possession of the New York Historical Society.]
This, with other knowledge obtained about the position of the ship by
whose crew he was said to have been taken, gives reason for believing
that the arrest was not made at Huntington by the crew of that ship,
but in the city of New York. The order proves also that, once
apprehended, he made not the slightest attempt at concealment, nor any
effort to escape his doom. The information gained by Hale's brother
Enoch in New York supports this belief as to his capture.
All that we actually know is, that he was captured while attempting to
make his way back to his friends, and that this must have been the
sharpest moment in his experience. Before it, he had hopes of escape;
after his capture he knew that his doom was certain, and his splendid
soul adapted itself quietly and bravely to the inevitable.
That fatal night--the night of the 21st of September--was in many
respects the most terrible that New York has ever passed through. A fire
had broken out near the docks at two in the morning, and was spreading
with fearful rapidity toward the upper part of the city, the blaze
carried northward by a strong breeze. It looked at one time as if
nothing could stop the conflagration, and that the whole city would be
destroyed.
For a time the enemy believed that the Americans had deliberately set
fire to their own city in order to expel the hated British. Later this
was found to be untrue, as the fire proved to have started in a low
drinking house where several coarse fellows were carousing. The fire
swept on, destroying more than five hundred houses, one fifth of all the
buildings then in the city, and was stopped only near Barclay Street by
a sudden sharp change in the wind, which blew the fire southward toward
the already burning district.
Report says that the provost marshal was given authority by Howe to
dispose summarily, without the delay of a trial, of any Americans found
rushing about the burning buildings, assuming, of course, that they were
intent on the destruction of more buildings, rather than on the natural
desire of saving what they could of their own property; and that as a
result of this authority, more than one hapless householder was thrown
into his own burning home.
Up to this point, the early or late evening of the 21st, there is more
or less of unsolvable mystery in regard to Nathan Hale's movements; but
from the memoirs of Captain William Hull, Nathan Hale's college friend
and companion in arms, we have what appears to be unimpeachable evidence
as to Hale's arrest and being brought to General Howe's headquarters. We
quote from Captain Hull the information he received from an English
officer through a flag of truce:
"I learned the melancholy particulars from this officer, who was present
at Hale's execution and seemed touched by the circumstances attending
it. He said that Captain Hale had passed through their army, both of
Long Island and [New] York Island. That he had procured sketches of the
fortifications, and made memoranda of their number and different
positions. When apprehended, he was taken before Sir William Howe, and
these papers, found concealed about his person, betrayed his intentions.
He at once declared his name, his rank in the American army, and his
object in coming within the British lines.
"Sir William Howe, without the form of a trial, gave orders for his
execution the following morning. He was placed in the custody of the
provost marshal. Captain Hale asked for a clergyman to attend him. His
request was refused. He then asked for a Bible; that too was refused.
"'On the morning of his execution,' continued the officer, 'my station
was near the fatal spot, and I requested the provost marshal to permit
the prisoner to sit in my marquee while he was making the necessary
preparations. Captain Hale entered; he was calm, and bore himself with
gentle dignity. He asked for writing materials, which I furnished him;
he wrote two letters, one to his mother and one to a brother officer.
He was shortly summoned to the gallows. But a few persons were around
him.'"
He was condemned to die in the early morning of the 22d, but in the
confusion prevailing throughout the city on account of the spreading
fire, at one time threatening the whole town, Provost Marshal Cunningham
must have been that morning very fully occupied, and it was late in the
forenoon before he completed his preparations for Hale's execution.
At eleven o'clock Cunningham was ready, and, as it proved, Nathan Hale
was ready also. Quietly standing among the few who had gathered to see
him die, and it is said in response to a taunt from Cunningham that if
he had any confession to make now was the time to make it, Hale
responded, glancing briefly at Cunningham and then calmly at the faces
about him, "I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my
country."
For once in his life Cunningham must have been astounded. With no plea
for mercy, no shrinking from the worst that Cunningham could do, this
man, still almost a boy in years, had shown himself utterly beyond his
power--had lifted himself forever from the doom of a victim to the grand
estate of a victor. One sharp, brief struggle and Nathan Hale was
free--dead, but victorious!
Indefinite as are most of the details, there are some unwritten points
that may confidently be assumed.
That 22d of September was a Sabbath day, a day associated in Nathan
Hale's mind with religious observances; prayers at the family altar,
readings of the Bible, and gatherings of his friends within church
walls. Whether or not his family knew the dangerous quest on which he
had ventured, he knew that he was not absent from their memories, and
that the family were bearing him in their thoughts that Sabbath morning.
No other day could have made that assurance so real to him, and this
thought was probably one of his strongest earthly consolations and
inspirations while he was awaiting the slow but relentless preparations
for his death.
No wonder that he bore himself "calmly and with dignity," as Captain
Montressor said of him. No wonder that he died bravely--seemingly
without a tremor of soul. In his last words Nathan Hale, true and
faithful in every relation and every act of his brief life, gave to his
country more than his life, more than all the hopes he was relinquishing
so freely for her sake. In one short, indomitable breath of patriotism,
he uttered words that will be forgotten only when American history
ceases to be read.
William Cunningham, Provost Marshal of the English forces in America,
murderer and inhuman jailer, would have laughed to scorn the idea that
any being, human or divine, could preserve Nathan Hale's last words for
the inspiration of coming generations, yet a kindly British officer,
Captain John Montressor, carried them to Hale's friends.
Cunningham has left a record of brutality unsurpassed in American
history. He is himself said to have boasted that he had caused the death
of two thousand American soldiers. We know that any reference to the
prison ships in New York Harbor sets Cunningham before us as a cowardly
murderer, starving men to death by depriving them of rations which the
English supplied for them, and which he sold, pocketing the proceeds. He
stands alone on a pedestal of infamy.
The letters that Hale had written and left, as he hoped, to be delivered
to his friends, Cunningham ruthlessly destroyed, giving as his reason
that "the rebels should not know that they had a man in their army who
could die with so much firmness." Though Hale's letters were destroyed,
the English officer, John Montressor, aide to General Howe--a gentleman
in whose presence we may safely assume that Cunningham, cowardly as all
brutal men are, had not dared to maltreat Nathan Hale as he was known
to maltreat other prisoners--that very Sunday evening spoke of Hale's
death to General Putnam and Captain Alexander Hamilton at the American
outposts where he had been sent with a flag of truce by General Howe to
arrange for an exchange of prisoners. More was learned when a flag of
truce was sent two days later to the British lines by General
Washington, in answer to the one on September 22. Two friends of Hale,
Captain Hull and Lieutenant Colonel Samuel Webb, were among those who
went with the flag.
Through these flags of truce--and perhaps others--were obtained all the
positive knowledge that Hale's friends were ever able to secure; but the
unvarnished story, told by Captain Montressor, gave all that was
essential to reveal to his friends his manly attitude when in the
presence of General Howe, and his calmness and dignity when he was
awaiting execution; while his last unpremeditated but immortal words, in
reply to Cunningham's taunt, proved to all his friends that he had died
as he had lived--a Christian patriot, and a hero.
We may suppose that Nathan Hale himself had not the remotest idea that
anything concerning his death would ever be made known to his friends
save that, detected as a spy, he had died as the penalty he had known
would follow capture. The words spoken by Nathan Hale, as his last
earthly thought, seem to prove that the thought, breathed from the
depths of his fearless soul, shall live as long as pure patriotism
thrills the souls of mortal men.